Moral disengagement among children and youth: A meta‐analytic review of links to aggressive behavior

Abstract

A growing body of research has demonstrated consistent links between Bandura's theory of moral disengagement and aggressive behavior in adults. The present meta-analysis was conducted to summarize the existing literature on the relation between moral disengagement and different types of aggressive behavior among school-age children and adolescents. Twenty-seven independent samples with a total of 17,776 participants (aged 8-18 years) were included in the meta-analysis. Results indicated a positive overall effect (r = .28, 95% CI [.23, .32]), supporting the hypothesis that moral disengagement is a significant correlate of aggressive behavior among children and youth. Analyses of a priori moderators revealed that effect sizes were larger for adolescents as compared to children, for studies that used a revised version of the original Bandura scale, and for studies with shared method variance. Effect sizes did not vary as a function of type of aggressive behavior, gender, or publication status. Results are discussed within the extant literature on moral disengagement and future directions are proposed.

Moral Disengagement and Discrimination Experiences as Predictors of Bullying Among Korean-American Adolescents

“…These findings are consistent with those of Turner (12) and Gini et al (9), suggesting that Korean-American adolescent bullies show moral attitudes similar to those of Caucasian-American adolescent bullies. Among the KoreanAmerican adolescents, boy bullies showed higher levels of moral disengagement than all the comparison groups.…”

“…This allows them to view the victim's life as holding less value than their own (5,6,8). It is also understood that bullies tend to have a distorted moral reasoning that minimizes their sense of guilt and justifies their negative behavior (6,9). Bullies may engage in cognitive moral disengagement to free themselves of guilt and remorse for bullying others (6,10).…”

Adaptation of Collective Moral Disengagement Scale into Turkish Culture for Adolescents

“…A positive meaningful relation was found at 0.41 level with Bullying Sub-scale of Bullying Scale and at 0.47 with Victim Sub-scale within the scope of compliance validity of the CMDS. When the literature was studied, a positive relation was determined between moral disengagement and bullying in adolescents [9,11,19,21,25,26]. In addition, in a meta-analysis work, a positive relation was found between moral disengagement and bullying [19].…”

“…When the literature was studied, a positive relation was determined between moral disengagement and bullying in adolescents [9,11,19,21,25,26]. In addition, in a meta-analysis work, a positive relation was found between moral disengagement and bullying [19]. In another study conducted with adolescents, 64 percent of students agreed the statement of "Bullying is part of childhood", 51 percent of them agreed on "Bullying makes people strong" and 56 percent of them supported "The students bullied deserve it" [9].…”

“…Researches done in the area shown individual and collective disengagement being positively associated with peer aggression and by-standing.. As compared to individual moral disengagement taking responsibility and reveling desired behavior is difficult in collective moral disengagement. In the later, responsibility is shared in the group [18,19,20].…”